Location Details

How much do you really know about Rosie the Riveter? There's the famous Westinghouse poster, and Norman Rockwell's Saturday Evening Post cover. But the "Rosie" phenomenon was so much more than those iconic images. Find out how the war Rosies paved the way for women in the workforce at the Rosie the Riveter/WWII Home Front National Historic Park in Richmond, which opened to the public in 2000 in the Ford building complex, near the old Richmond Kaiser shipyards. Start by getting schooled in all things Rosie at the park's Visitor Center before moving on to the Rosie the Riveter Memorial, which began as a public art project for the City of Richmond in the 1990s, and the Red Oak, the last remaining Victory ship built in Richmond. If you're lucky, you might catch a talk given by a ranger with real experience: Ranger Betty Reid Soskin discusses her experience as a young African-American woman during the war, while docent Flora Ninomiya shares stories from a childhood partially spent in an internment camp. With such a rich history, the park is definitely worth a visit.